UK Labour Leadership election

A Dub in Glasgo

The Labour Party should split as there is no future in following right wing policies when claiming to stand up for the poor and lower paid workers.


What is the Labour Party for?

The electoral system is the first thing that needs to be changed as we currently have the Tories with an overall majority in Parliament on less than 37% of the vote, they rule with no compromises the 100%. It is even worse in Scotland where the Tories got 15% of the vote and have 1 MP out of 59

Sam Russell

I think Smith preceded Blair and unfortunately died prematurely.

Why do people swallow the Tory press line that Labour suffered a devestating loss in the election when they gained 1.5% in the popular vote, more than twice the Tory gain of .8%, (compared with 2010) and had a net loss of seats to the Tories of zero? What cost the Labour victory was their performance in Scotland and the collapse of the LibDems.

Labour had the wrong brother and the wrong campaign. They will choose the wrong leader this time as well.

loyatemu

Sam Russell wrote: »

They will choose the wrong leader this time as well.

who is the right choice?

Sam Russell

loyatemu wrote: »

who is the right choice?

None of the current candidates.

loyatemu

Sam Russell wrote: »

None of the current candidates.

LuckyLloyd

The Conservatives have been selling a very clear vision of Britain and a straightforward centre right platform. I think the best thing the Labour Party could do right now is stand for something, offer a different vision. Cherry picking specific policies to offer a different slant on to the Conservatives is a failed strategy imo. They got hammered in Scotland by the SNPs who offered a clear platform.

In 2020 the UK will have had a decade of Conservative government and naturally start considering voting for "change". Labour have a half decade to start defining how British society can change under their leadership. Their end destination can't be more of where they currently are and, as such, he's the best of the four main candidates imo.

loyatemu

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

In 2020 the UK will have had a decade of Conservative government and naturally start considering voting for "change".

Barring some seismic shock, the economy is likely to improve between now and 2020 and the Tories can dispense some sweeties to the proles. Hard to see Labour making up enough ground to beat them in 2020 regardless of who the leader is (though what happens in Scotland is a bit of a wildcard).

Sam Russell

I think that Labours best chance is for a Tory implosion over the EU or devolution. Their policies might appear to be centre ground but they will not be implemented that way.

Labour need a much wider vision than Tory-lite. They are just 5% behind the Tories in the popular vole, and the Tories are only 36% overall - just over one third of the vote.

TwoGallants

This is a problem all over Europe. The traditional center left parties have swallowed the neoliberal dogma whole. The result? Real falls in living standards for the vast majority of people, enormous gains for the very rich. Its great that we have smartphones now and all that, but I've never understood the logic of privatising natural monopolies like the trains or the post, and I've never understood why Labour just embraced this dogma.

Europe is changing folks, there is a new politics now, and Corbyn may well be the man to bring that change to Britain.

Si, Podemos!

LuckyLloyd

loyatemu wrote: »

Barring some seismic shock, the economy is likely to improve between now and 2020 and the Tories can dispense some sweeties to the proles. Hard to see Labour making up enough ground to beat them in 2020 regardless of who the leader is (though what happens in Scotland is a bit of a wildcard).

Sure, 2020 is probably not winnable. But the Conservatives will not stay in power forever. Labour's present focus needs to be on forming a coherent full platform. If they continue to run campaigns like 2015 it will delay their return to office and dull its potential impact.

BoJack Horseman

TwoGallants wrote: »

Europe is changing folks, there is a new politics now, and Corbyn may well be the man to bring that change to Britain.

It seems that 'new politics' is actually very old politics.
The politics that Europe, thankfully discarded after 1989.
It isn't coming back.

Si, Podemos!

No we won't..... And certainly the Brits won't.

Harry Palmr

A Corbyn led Labour party could just be what the Lib Dems need, if the party does take a strong lurch leftwards for long enough then there could be an exodus. In the 80s the "Gang of Four" founded the Social Democratic Party which allied with the Liberals. Had Britain a PR system they might have usurped Labour in 1983. One of the great what-ifs of recent political history.

gallag

Mabey the problem is that socialism/leftist politics are dead? People are more educated these days with better media coverage and online knowledge. The people at the last election decided to knuckle down and get our finances in order instead of pushing the problem down the road as labour would have had us do, the people never bought into labour's take more from the rich bs because they could see the statistics that the richest 10% pay near all the bloody taxes anyway leaving the bottom 50% of earners to pay nothing, the people seen how over taxing worked in France! The Torys are now taking in record tax takings, the highest ever while taking millions of low earners out of the tax system all together, the left have been found out is the problem.

BoJack Horseman

When you lower income taxes on top earners & bring in more money, raising it again, to the inevitable detriment of exchequer figures just looks like spite.

Spite doesn't make for good law.

Its tough for labour.
Raise taxes rates just to lower returns may appeal to the base, but its bad for the country & will hurt when appealing to the centre

A Dub in Glasgo

gallag wrote: »

Mabey the problem is that socialism/leftist politics are dead? People are more educated these days with better media coverage and online knowledge. The people at the last election decided to knuckle down and get our finances in order instead of pushing the problem down the road as labour would have had us do, the people never bought into labour's take more from the rich bs because they could see the statistics that the richest 10% pay near all the bloody taxes anyway leaving the bottom 50% of earners to pay nothing, the people seen how over taxing worked in France! The Torys are now taking in record tax takings, the highest ever while taking millions of low earners out of the tax system all together, the left have been found out is the problem.

The people in the above post = 37% who voted Tory on a 66% turnout. That fails the Tory test for introducing limits on trade union strike action - yet the Tories rule the 100% with no compromise to the 67% who did not vote Tory

Yeah, the people have spoken - 67% did not want Tory. The mess is a result of the electoral system

gallag

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

The people in the above post = 37% who voted Tory on a 66% turnout. That fails the Tory test for introducing limits on trade union strike action - yet the Tories rule the 100% with no compromise to the 67% who did not vote Tory

Yeah, the people have spoken - 67% did not want Tory. The mess is a result of the electoral system

Well that's a pretty non point rant! Did the criteria change this year or something? Do you think the SNP should give it's seats to UKIP?

A Dub in Glasgo

It was in response to your erroneous use of the word 'people' as if the majority voted Tory. Tory 36.8% versus Labour 30.4% is not as big a gap as you are making out in your post

gallag

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

It was in response to your erroneous use of the word 'people' as if the majority voted Tory. Tory 36.8% versus Labour 30.4% is not as big a gap as you are making out in your post

Are you new to this? It's just this system has been in place for a long time! And generally it's been accepted to say the people have spoken, or were you making these same pointless arguments when labour won also?

A Dub in Glasgo

Looks like you are new to democratic means

Yes, I was making these 'pointless' arguments when Labour was in power. The FPTP system is fine when it is a binary choice, not so when there is more

ancapailldorcha

gallag wrote: »

Are you new to this? It's just this system has been in place for a long time! And generally it's been accepted to say the people have spoken, or were you making these same pointless arguments when labour won also?

Who's said that Labour won? It's been stated that they won more votes than last time around which would be logical given how toxic they were at the time re: Iraq, the expenses scandal, etc...

loyatemu

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

The FPTP system is fine when it is a binary choice, not so when there is more

Even then - you could have 50.1% vote Tory and 49.9% vote Whig; if that proportion was exactly the same in every constituency under FPTP you would end up with no Whig MPs (though only some list-based PR would solve that scenario).

Sam Russell

gallag wrote: »

Are you new to this? It's just this system has been in place for a long time! And generally it's been accepted to say the people have spoken, or were you making these same pointless arguments when labour won also?

This is not new, but it does not make it right or democratic. Margaret Thatcher won three elections with about 46% of the vote each time and rules as if she had got 60%, including going to way against Argentina.

It has been this way since they brought in universal suffrage because poor people live in concentrated areas and others live more dispersed areas. Places like South Wales have majorities like 80% while more middle class areas have
smaller majorities. I think the Tories have about 40 seats (iirc) north of Sheffield, but huge number of seats in the areas south of Birmingham, not including the London boroughs.

Of course having a Tory press helps them enormously, and the BBC allowing their participants to ridicule Labour leaders helps as well (I am thinking of Neil Kinnock, Michael Foot, and Ed Milliband).

gallag

Sam Russell wrote: »

This is not new, but it does not make it right or democratic. Margaret Thatcher won three elections with about 46% of the vote each time and rules as if she had got 60%, including going to way against Argentina.

It has been this way since they brought in universal suffrage because poor people live in concentrated areas and others live more dispersed areas. Places like South Wales have majorities like 80% while more middle class areas have
smaller majorities. I think the Tories have about 40 seats (iirc) north of Sheffield, but huge number of seats in the areas south of Birmingham, not including the London boroughs.

Of course having a Tory press helps them enormously, and the BBC allowing their participants to ridicule Labour leaders helps as well (I am thinking of Neil Kinnock, Michael Foot, and Ed Milliband).

I don't really get your point on Argentina? Shout a prime minister not act when a foreign country tries a land grab? Also there was massive British support for defending the faulklands! Really seems like you are trying to drop your own off topic bias in there.

Tabnabs

Anyone on twitter should follow @corbynjokes some very important issues being highlighted

https://twitter.com/corbynjokes/status/625252262726770688

laoch na mona

Corbyn really is labours best hope if they want to actually be a labour party. Another Blairite leader won't help anybody but the tories and tory voters

TwoGallants

I think Corbyn's surge should be seen in a European context. I live in Barcelona, and the party I voted for (Barcelona en comu, affiliated to Podemos) is led by Ada Colau, who before she became mayor was an anti-eviction activist. The leader of Podemos is Pablo Iglesias, whose grandfather was murdered by Franco for being a communist and who could very well become the next Presidente del gobierno! Instead of carping on about leftiest pieties, like Izquierda Unida (United Left) have done for years, with their 8% national comfort zone, they are engaging at grass roots level, working with civil society activists and getting some pretty amazing results for a bunch of people who a couple of years ago would have been written off as irrelevant leftists...

Now, whether their politics are problematic or not is besides the point. Spain has enormous inequality (the average wages for the top 10% are broadly similar to those in Britain, France, Germany etc.) but for everyone else its like 40-50% lower than in the advanced economies of Europe. There is huge suffering, people getting evicted and made homeless, unemployment at enormous rates, and when there are jobs they are paid at subsistence levels, by and large. But the rich in Spain have never been richer.

People know this. People are aware that somehow they are getting screwed. The PSOE (The socialists) did their New Labour thing a while back and when there was a boom in the country they generally walked arm in arm with the property developers and the bankers. Now when I, and others, look at them I only feel disappointment. They offer nothing to the average man or woman, just like Labour without Corbyn.

I'm glad that in Spain the populist movement is a genuinely democratic and progressive one, but in other countries it can be quite dark (look at France, Denmark, or even the UK with UKIP)

Corbyn seems genuine when he talks about building a social movement with Labour at its heart. There is a broad constituency for a Corbynite Labour party. In fact, I'm fairly confident that with Corbyn leading Labour into the next election, they would win back most of the votes of UKIP and the Greens, and reclaim many Scottish seats. I wouldn't be surprised by a 40% plus national vote for the Labour party. If I were him, I'd start by deselecting the most right wing New Labourites and replacing them with committed Labour people. Honestly, these people should just come out of the closet as Tories already.

All of this reminds me of a great book and TV series, 'A very British coup', where a left wing Labour Prime Minister is overthrown by a combination of the deep state, the US, and a Tory press. Did anyone else think the same when they saw the right wing press and the Tory Labourites speaking out against him?

TwoGallants

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

It seems that 'new politics' is actually very old politics.
The politics that Europe, thankfully discarded after 1989.
It isn't coming back.

Are you a member of the precariat? Because if you're not, chances are things are going pretty well for you. The precariat is a nice, catch all term for people in jobs (or without jobs!) that are prone to automation, on unreliable and limited hours contracts, in temporary positions, working for agencies etc. Their ranks are growing and they're angry as hell. We know what happens when a small minority grows ever richer and a majority grows ever more immiserated... Millions die in revolution, because the owners of privilege, the rent seekers, the hoarders of capital refuse to reform. Well, that is not something I want to see happen. Socialism may be an old idea, but exploitation is a much older one.

No we won't..... And certainly the Brits won't.

The same people who created the NHS, free public education, the welfare state...

BoJack Horseman

TwoGallants wrote: »

I wouldn't be surprised by a 40% plus national vote for the Labour party.

One just has to look at the electoral success of 'Militant/Socialist Party' or the 'Socialist Labour Party'..... No, wait, poppycock.

No uk party has ever won a GE by abandoning the centre....

There may be a 4-5% extreme left vote in Britain, but the miniscule electoral impact of the far-left indicates I'm being extremely generous.

Labour were successful because they took the centre & made the Tories irrelevant.
Sure, the hardliners felt abandoned, but the majority of people are in the centre & if a party wants its platform enacted it has to win first.

Electing Len McKluskey's man is just going to lock the next 2 GEs for Dave & Gideon.

I didn't think Corbyn would win, but he has the money & the manpower.... It looks like he may pull it off.

I hope he does.

jank

TwoGallants wrote: »

The best Prime Minister the Tories ever had was Tony Blair, because he moved the debate and the paradigm far to the right. The other contenders just want to be Tory-lite. Nobody except Corbyn is making a convincing anti-neoliberal economic message.

It was Blair was the child of Thatcher, don't forget that.

blinding

Three of the Labour candidates are like that butter replacement

"I can't believe its not butter"

They are

"I can't believe there not Tories"